WHEN 11-year-old Dawn Tyree plucked up the courage to phone her father and tell him the family friend she was staying with was sexually abusing her, she thought her ordeal would finally come to an end.

But her dad and stepmum decided Dawn should marry her 32-year-old rapist and have his baby – rather than bring 'shame' on their family.

Tragically, Dawn is just one of thousands of child brides who end up marrying their abusers in the US – where some states still allow underage marriage for children as young as 10 with parental or judicial consent.

Between 2000 and 2015, over 200,000 minors were legally married in the United States.

Last year Sherry Johnson – who also appears in the documentary – told The Sun's Child Bride campaign how she gave birth at the age of 10 before being forced to marry her rapist when she was 11 and he 20.

Dawn's heart-breaking story is told in the C&I documentary, I Was A Child Bride: The Untold Story, which airs tonight.

Left alone with a rapist as dad and stepmum moved 1,500 miles away

Dawn grew up in a small farmhouse in California and never knew her biological mother.

Her father never “connected” with her, and from a young age she was passed off to different family members to look after.

At nine, one of those family members began to sexually abuse her – but although she asked for help, she says she was “hushed and shamed”.

When her father re-married, the stepmother who might have been expected to offer some kind of ‘motherly’ comfort, washed her hands of her.

“The first time that I met her, she let me know that her two children were adults and that she had no intentions of raising another child,” says Dawn.

“Immediately I felt unwelcome in her home. She made it seem as if there was something wrong with me and she thought I needed structure, a private Catholic school, strict rules, as if I was an out-of-control child.

"And actually it was the years of sexual abuse and pain that had affected me.”

When Dawn was 11, her father and stepmother bought a house 1,500 miles away in Texas to start a new life and business together. Amazingly, they left Dawn behind at the house in California, to finish her sixth grade at school.

Her stepmother came up with a plan to move a 30-year-old male friend into the house to care for Dawn. Although he was not her original abuser, he immediately began preying on the vulnerable young girl.

“When I had a girlfriend over and we were playing in the backyard in water, he told me how beautiful I looked in my swimsuit,” says Dawn. “He was just building me up to feel older than what I was. He conditioned me and prepped me for the first act of sexual intercourse.”

'My stepmum forced me to marry my rapist when I got pregnant'

Dawn remembers tearful calls to her dad and stepmum, where she begged them to come and get her but her pleas were dismissed and she felt her allegations of abuse were disbelieved.

After finishing sixth grade she thought she would be able to leave her horrific life behind and be reunited with her father and stepmum.

But they were away a lot on business so, incredibly, her stepmum invited her abuser to move with her to Texas so he could continue to ‘look after her’.

“There was a part of me that felt doomed,” says Dawn.

At 13, she suddenly became sleepy and lethargic and her abuser took her to see a doctor. A couple of days later came the shocking news – she was pregnant.

“My parents, myself, and my abuser sat down for dinner one night, and he told them that I was pregnant and he let them know that he was the father. My father got up and walked out of the house. He didn’t say anything.”

To Dawn's horror, instead of shopping her abuser, her parents were desperate to cover up their own roles in the abuse.

“There was a lot of tension,” she recalls. “I could feel the presence of fear. I don't recall any shouting, name-calling, fighting, just a lot of stress for several days.

"My stepmother let me know that the best option for me was to be married to my abuser.”

As for the baby, the pregnancy would be secretly terminated.

“My stepmother and I were alone for a couple of days and she said she had some tried-and-true home remedies to terminate the pregnancy.”

But eventually it was decided that Dawn should just keep the baby and live with her rapist as a ‘happily married’ wife and mother. Amazingly, nobody questioned the fact that a 32-year-old man was marrying a 13-year-old girl.

The quickie wedding at the local courthouse – legal in 1985 with parental consent – was over in a flash.

“There was a lot of stress the day of the marriage. The only happy person was my abuser. I don't recall signing any legal document. My father's signature was enough for me to get married. No one batted an eye. It was like a business transaction.”

'Dad made it clear he wouldn't help me escape abuse'

Packing to move back with him to California, Dawn put some stuffed cuddly animals in the car.

“My stepmother came out and yanked them out, saying, ‘You don't need these in your life anymore. You're a mother and a wife,’” Dawn recalls.

“The marriage was a way to cover up the rape and to avoid any child services investigation and any neglect charges against my parents. And it was a way to keep my husband out of prison.

“I felt incredibly alone as a child bride. People were shocked when they learned of my age or how old I was when I got married and how old my husband was.

"Any time I would make a new friend, I'd lose them shortly after when their family learned about my living circumstances.”

But Dawn found the true nature of love when her son, Chris, was born.

“When he was out of the womb in my arms, it was an infinite amount of love that I had experienced for the first time in my life. It was profound.”

A year later she was pregnant again.

“After my daughter was born a fear took over my heart and I knew I had to leave. My father and stepmother made it very clear that they were not going to help me should I choose to leave the marriage.

“I was going to have to do it on my own. When I told my husband that I wanted to leave he hid the car keys, told me that I had no bank account or high school diploma and that I wouldn’t be able to make my own way. It was just total control with him.”

But somehow she managed to summon up the will-power to leave with her children when she was 16 and to survive as a single mum.

'Stepmum backed my abuser in custody battle'

Dawn found a house share, went back to school and worked part time in Toys R Us to get by.

She was also forced to fight for custody of the children after her abuser called her an “unfit mother”and took her to court to get them back.

The terrible irony of the situation was not lost on Dawn.

“When I wanted to be independent and leave the marriage, it was not okay for me to have the kids,” she says.

“It's okay for me to be wife, mother and have sex at 13, 14, but it wasn't okay for me to be 16, 17 and 18 with them.

“My stepmother wrote a letter to the judge at the court saying, ‘Give those kids back to their dad. She shouldn't have them.’ I never received any child support for my children and we suffered well below the poverty line.”

Child Brides in the United States

• Most states set the minimum marriage age at 16 or 18 but there are loopholes in all but two of the 50 state laws which allow marriage before the age of 18 with parental or judical consent.
• Child marriage laws are written in a way that undermines statutory rape laws. Having sex with a child of a certain age is considered rape unless you're married.
• Today, there are still 18 states that don't specify any minimum age for marriage, which means a child as young as one could marry.
• Women who are married before the age of 18 are 31 per cent more likely to live in poverty and three times more likely to be victims of domestic abuse.
• 70 per cent of child marriages end in divorce.
• Teen brides are three times more likely to be physically abused.

After three years of marriage and a two-year custody battle, Dawn finally divorced her husband at the age of 18 and says it took her seven years to get back on her feet and put a roof over her children's head.

Now 47, she eventually found love with new partner, Larry.

“I have spent many years feeling like it's been my fault and my voice doesn't matter and have been shamed and ostracised by being sexually abused and then married at 13.

“But I heard a quote that rang very true. It was, ‘Little girls don't stay little forever.’ They grow up, and they speak their truth.

"And I would like to tell every single paedophile, ‘Beware. The truth will come out.’"

I was a Child Bride: The Untold Story – 6th August at 9pm on Crime+Investigation

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